MORE parking fees and restrictions are planned for streets around central Bradford, it has been revealed.

Bradford Council has proposed a host of changes to on-street parking rules in the roads near The Broadway, in the city’s cathedral precinct.

This would see fees introduced or extended in some areas and parking times limited in others.

It follows controversial plans announced earlier this summer to increase the hours for on-street parking fees in the struggling top end of town - a move opposed by the Bradford District Chamber of Trade, whose secretary, Val Summerscales, branded it “an absolute folly”.

Mrs Summerscales said the Chamber of Trade had not yet officially met to discuss this new tranche of parking proposals.

But she said she feared it could put people off coming into the city centre altogether.

She said: “In general, we would be opposed to the extension of charging hours and the introduction of more paid on-street parking.

“It’s presuming that everybody that would be parking there would be going into The Broadway, because a lot of it is the ones that are nearest to The Broadway and would preclude them from parking on the street when they go there.

“What the council fails to realise is people come into Bradford for other reasons and it will hit them as well.”

Deputy council leader Councillor Val Slater said the authority was trying to get a more consistent approach to its on-street parking and respond to complaints by local residents.

She said: “It’s looking for more consistency across the city. We have already looked at the top end of town and we are generally trying to get a consistent approach about parking because there is nothing more annoying to people - traders, residents and people going about their daily business - than when something gets sorted and the problem just moves somewhere else.”

She said the consultation was ongoing and they would consider all views put forward.

Under the plans, the following changes would be made:

Pay-and-display parking spaces, with a maximum two-hour stay, on lengths of Valley Road and Bolton Road;

Pay-and-display parking spaces, with a maximum two-hour stay and some allowances for permit holders, on lengths of Mill Street and Canal Road;

No waiting at any time on lengths of Stott Hill and Wharf Street;

Waiting times limited to 10 minutes on a length of Currer Street;

Waiting times limited to an hour on a length of Bolton Road;

Waiting times limited to four hours on a length of Captain Street;

Parking places for disabled people, coaches and police vehicles on lengths of Dale Street, Captain Street, Piccadilly and Bridge Street.

The hours the restrictions apply to vary, street-by-street.

Anyone who wishes to object to the changes should write to the council’s City Solicitor Parveen Akhtar at City Hall, Bradford, BD1 1HY by Friday, August 26, quoting reference LEG/PCD/SPN/73071.